Flatland: the Madness of the Pliny
Chapter One: Pliny the First
They arrived in wooden boats with iron swords, and the peaceful native farmers never had any hope of escape. The men called themselves the Valhallan, and they quickly took over the scattered tribes and farmland. In that time the land was lush and the animals plentiful. The Vahallan brought no women with them, but took women from the farmers instead. They began to interbreed with the native people, and their sons were strong and fierce.
Their leader was a man named Kartusian, but as he looked out over the fertile fields and lakes he declared, "I will call myself Pliny (which is Great King in the old tongue). He made the tribes send a tithe of their sons to serve him, and the Vahallans drank and made war as the people suffered.
Over time Pliny learned to love the people, and he became a wiser king, if not a gentle one. He allowed the villages to make their own laws as long as they sent their sons to serve him and sent him a yearly offering of animals and money. The people didn't love him, but they were a taciturn lot and grew to accept their new way of life.
When he was in his 52nd year, Pliny the First fell ill with a harsh fever. He lay in bed many days seeing strange fevered visions and mumbling dark prophesies. When his fever abated he was a changed king, and the people suffered again. He became obsessed with the idea that the land should be flat. His warriors had conquered every people in range of their boats and had grown bored. They welcomed Pliny's new vision with the enthusiasm of a child with a new toy.
Pliny called together the elders of the village and explained to them his plan. "All of the land shall be brought to the level of the sea. Even the mountains will fall before my might!"
The elders begged him to listen to reason. "Our farmland will be ruined! The sea storms will kill us all!" they cried, but Pliny still had the fever vision, and he bade them be silent.
His men sought for able-bodied workers throughout the kingdom, until there were only the old and infirm left in the villages. The men were given iron shovels and pickaxes and set to breaking the stone and hauling the sand to Pliny's massive storehouses. He made great stores of all sorts of landscape. Nothing escaped his madness. Dirt, cobblestone, gravel, even the very flowers and wood of the land were stored, for in his arrogance he assumed that his successors would want to follow his secret plan. He told no one why he created such stores. Even his Vahallan advisors were turned away with a quiet smile. "I will build something the world will remember forever. Vahallans will never fade from the earth."
His warriors believed him, and drove the people harder. Farms were torn apart, and hills and mountains pulled down bit by bit. For hundreds of miles around Pliny's headquarters nothing could be seen but ugly flat landscape, but to Pliny it had the beauty of order about it.
It wasn't long before famine and starvation took its toll, but the people were resourceful. They began to fish for food and to plant in the areas that were left untouched because they were already at sea level. Pliny allowed the workers to return home to plant and harvest, but the women, children, and old villagers were forced to work the farms. They grew thin and many died, but the sons of the Vahallans were strong and persevered.
When enough materials had been gathered, Pliny declared that the Flattening would stop for a time. He built a large wooden platform so he could address the people with his booming voice, and when the workers had assembled along with the village elders and his own Vahallans he announced his great plan.
"I am a god!" he said. "The proof is before you." He swept his hand toward the great man-made plain. "Could any mortal have done this? No, of course not. Worship me!"
A great cheer arose from his warriors, and they shook their iron swords in the air. "Pliny is god!" they yelled.
The people looked at one another in confusion. Perhaps he was a god? If he was one, he was immortal, and they had hoped for respite when he died.
Pliny saw their confusion and laughed. They would understand when they saw the works he would perform. "People of Flatland – for so he called his kingdom – you shall build for me a great pyramid, a massive structure to show my power. And it shall be built entirely out of sand where I stand right now. No other materials shall be used, for sand is the weakest of building materials and will show my power by building the strongest structure."
It was the logic of a madman, but the madman had warriors to back him up. The people went to work, hauling sand from the storehouses to the area designated for the pyramid.
Halman, the man designated as foreman, approached Pliny. He bowed and kept his eyes facing the ground until Pliny said, "you may look at your god".
"Great Pliny, forgive my ignorance, but I lack the wisdom of a god. How shall we build your pyramid out of sand?"
Pliny called the court magician, a bold man known for calling lightening out of the air to frighten children, and setting farm animals on fire to watch them run through the forest and light the trees.
Kigg – for so was he called – poured out a bucket of sand on the floor and waved his arms over it. It formed itself into a block. Halman gasped and poked it with a finger. It was solid, but it still had the shifting properties of sand. Kigg gave him a smug look.
"See how your god is wise?" Pliny asked, but Halman thought it was strange the "god" didn't perform such feats on his own.
"Of course, Great Pliny," Halman answered diplomatically.
"Proceed with the building," Pliny said, and he waved his hand to dismiss the foreman. Halman backed out of the room, bowing as he did so. It was forbidden to turn one's back to the king. To do so was death for any but the Vahallans.
The sand blocks were difficult to work with. They would stack and stay where they were placed because of the magic built into them, but they shifted and bent according to their own will. Some workers they seemed to respect, and they lay quietly. Some others they had a dislike for, and they moved and struggled against the builders. Halman learned to use such workers for building wooden scaffolds or bring water and food after several were pushed off the rising structure. A worker even said he saw the sand move in a way that sent a man plunging to his death.
Pliny had explicit instructions, and the pyramid was to reach almost to the clouds themselves. The Vahallans had become infected with Pliny's madness, and they pushed the workers to exhaustion. They built the Great Pyramid in thirty years exactly, and on the day it was finished Pliny called them together. He made a rambling speech which few of them could hear, for he was old and infirm. His warriors had grown old and been replaced with their sons and the sons of villagers who believed in Pliny's godhood.
Pliny retired to his house at the base of the pyramid, and when his chambermaid came to serve him in the morning, she found him still in bed. He had died in his sleep, content that his pyramid would ensure he was remembered forever.
The warriors mourned his passing, and the people pretended to. Secretly, the people of Flatland celebrated, for they had lost a tyrant. The king's son was known to be wise, if not gentle, and they had hope again.